


Nightingale's Starling

by drekadair



Series: Tales from the Folly [8]
Category: Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-20
Updated: 2019-02-20
Packaged: 2019-10-31 23:06:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17858768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drekadair/pseuds/drekadair
Summary: Nightingale reflects on what he wanted in an apprentice.





	Nightingale's Starling

**I.**  
  
Clever and tough, I said. That was what I wanted in an apprentice.  
  
In my mind, I envisioned someone as clever as me, as tough as me. This was not arrogance, you understand, for I did not consider myself to be extraordinarily gifted in these traits. I merely wanted someone who could keep up.  
  
I was young and foolish when I said that.

  
  
**II.**  
  
The war destroyed us all, one way or another. I was no exception. A man less broken might not have spent so many nights lying awake in his bed and dreaming about what he might have done differently: if I had said something different here, perhaps those ones might have lived: if I had acted differently there, perhaps that one might have survived.  
  
Clever and tough. These were traits I admired in myself, but I had not been good enough. My apprentice would have to be better. More clever than I, more tough.  
  
But it was too late for apprentices now. I was too old. The world was too old.

  
  
**III.**  
  
Youth returned to me like spring, inexorable and terrifying because it promised more winters to come. I had been prepared for death and did not now know what to do once it was taken from me.  
  
I had learned things about myself, in those long years of dying and then not-dying: terrible things about my strengths and my weaknesses. I could not wish my apprentice to be anything like myself. I could not wish that upon anyone.  
  
Clever and tough, that was what I needed in an apprentice: clever and tough as I was not.

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by bingeing the work of my favorite poet, Louise Glück. I think I was reading _Faithful and Virtuous Night_ when I wrote this, though I am currently re-reading _Meadowlands_ , which prompted me to actually post it after letting it languish for a while. Please do check out some of her poems, I cannot say enough how much I love her.


End file.
